bigpale

There's a lot of "not as bad as you might think..." kind of phrases here.

Which just sounds like "pro-Nintendo reviewer trying not to say it but really wanting to say it"

I was a day one buyer, but I have barely touched it after beating Bonanza. That and MK World are all I've gotten for it. Everything else I've already played on PC.

I'm just patiently waiting for Metroid Prime.

Absolutely nothing beats Super Metroid's opening.

The eerie music, the chirping of the baby metroid, seemingly happy and content in its little holding case, while scientists lie dead on the floor around it. It's absolute cinema!

More options should be available.

Have the option to download a title, but also maybe have the option to stream a game via online connection.

@swoose You can still have the games displayed in the app, just make it so that when you click to play a game, you're given the "download now?" option.

But also, as I say, the option to play immediately via streaming (if you're currently online) should be there too.

The sticks don't feel real, maaan... they don't feel real!

snagged one from Target (but it says it will arrive by mail between June 6-11, though that might just be a placeholder). That's the one I bought for my son.

snagged another from Wal-Mart, same-day arrival by mail, June 5. That one's mine.

Eternal Darkness deserves a full-on remake/remaster, but I don't know if that'll ever happen. I replayed it last year and it holds up exceptionally well.

I would love for Monolith to be commissioned to make a proper remake of Zelda: OOT. Leave the main Zelda team free to make the next 3D entry.

It was very clearly filled with leftovers, with only Metroid being a AAA title (and its inclusion was out of obligation more than anything). I think the point was to say: There will be Switch games through at least 2026, all of which will be playable on Switch 1 or Switch 2.

It wouldn't surprise me, considering the similar architecture between S1 and S2, to see Nintendo continue to support the Switch with small, cheap titles, throughout the life of the Switch 2. AAA games on S2 will cost 70 bucks, but cheap, minor titles can be released on Switch (still playable on S2) for 30-50 bucks.

I would prefer both a subscription service that lets me play whatever, and the ability to buy individual games and play them with or without the subscription. Basically, what Gamepass offers on Xbox.

Other than the mystery of the C-button, I can hardly get myself worked up about the new system reveal. For me, it's all about the games. This is an iterative console, akin to the SNES, Gamecube, and WiiU.

I'll save my uber hype for Nintendo's next revolutionary system, i.e. the big VR headset, the Nintendo Super Virtual Boy!

@EightyTwoStu It looks right if you take the image and flip it horizontally, so that the blue is on the left side of the image.

The Nintendo advantage will be in how the system is priced.

Sony's handheld will be 400 bucks and won't be justifiable.

Microsoft has a chance to do something with Gamepass. Maybe a Series-S quality handheld that comes with a Gamepass sub for 300 bucks. That's attractive.

That is incredible.

Oh look, Nintendo dropped a new video about an upcoming product...

It's an alarm clock.

Never change, N

I suspect we'll get something in either late OCT or early NOV to push the holiday releases. Nothing Switch 2 related though. I don't suspect we'll get that until January.

Granted, the Switch was revealed on Oct 20, 2016, but the WiiU was dead in the water so it's not like Nintendo was worried about cutting into their holiday sales.

I suspect a full reveal in January, followed by a Super Bowl commercial in early February, followed by a release in March.

regardless of the inspiration/copying debate, the Playstation game just looks painfully generic

I guess I'm the odd duck, but I don't see the appeal in retro games that try to emulate the 64/Saturn/PSX era of graphics. I don't see the charm in the low-quality look. To me, it's not the same as a game like Shovel Knight that tries to emulate the 8 or 16-bit era with hand-drawn sprites and chiptune music. A well-drawn sprite has a timeless quality that a low-poly model doesn't.

But, as I say, I may just be in the minority.

@Banks Sadly no, I sold it all several years back. I wish I hadn't lol

Picked up a VB soon after it was discontinued. Local Wal-Mart had it for about 50 bucks and games were going for like 10 dollars a pop. Came with Mario Tennis, and I picked up Wario Land, Red Alarm, and Mario Clash.

I have a lot of silly nostalgia for it, including the way my eyes would feel after a long playthrough of Wario Land. I used to lay on my bed in the dark with the headset resting on my face.

I wish I could play Xenoblade Chronicles again for the first time. That ending sequence, when you see the location marker and it tells you where in space you are (no spoilers)...I lost my mind and had to put the controller down to stare at the screen for several seconds before continuing.

I don't think it needs a remake per se, but I think it's one of those very few transcendent games that can be remade with improved controls/visuals/QOL tweaks every 10-15 years and no one would complain. I certainly wouldn't.

A part of me wishes they had expanded the content just a smidgen, like adding a proper boss fight on Star Hill, instead of the same underwhelming sequence the original game had.

Other than that I am loving it. It's like going back to a good book.

Ocarina is the most easily adaptable, IMO.

It has a strong character narrative, in that Link is a boy forced by destiny to (figuratively) abandon his childhood, going on a dangerous quest to stop the villain... only to discover (halfway through) that he was actually being manipulated by the villain, who takes over the world, causing the boy to (literally) abandon his childhood, going to sleep for 7 years in order to fight and defeat the villain's years of tyranny. After that, he is allowed to return to his childhood and relive the life that was deprived him.

Easy sequel material to spin off into Majora's Mask and Wind Waker.

Amazing. I remember reading this site when it first launched, along with the old Planet Gamecube site, too.

Hard to believe how much has changed since then

Am I the only one who just doesn't like the art style of the SNES All Stars game? Not just SMB3 but I don't like any of them. The original SMB game on All Stars looks like one of those weird Sega Genesis rom hack games.

I would not have wanted to know about the big musical number in New Donk City, for example.

This one's not really fair. The Japanese covers are virtually the same and they're splitting the vote. I voted for the FDS version but I would have voted for the green border famicom version had the FDS not been an option. I think the Japanese design is winning 2 to 1. I love the USA's golden box and cart but the Japanese art is wonderful and sells the adventure.

That music is definitely a remix of a previous Mario game, but I can't place it. I can hum it. I know it. But I don't remember which one it is.

I think the biggest improvement is the new animations. As mentioned, it has tons more personality than the previous NEW games, and has the kind of expressiveness and variety that hasn't been seen since Mario World.

Remember in Mario World when you could crouch as regular Mario, or look up? Remember looking up? I loved looking up!

Wonder has personality, which is what was sorely lacking in the NEW games.

Another big change is the 3/4 turn that Mario has in his pose now, as opposed to the profile stance he mostly used in the NEW games. It takes some getting used to but it allows for more expressiveness in the face.

Beyond that, the rest is just a needed update to the overall coat of paint. The "wonder" gimmick is just that, and it will need to be played before anyone can really judge it.

Am I the only who noticed how in this game and in the new 2D game Mario seems like he has no neck?

Not that he's ever been scrawny, but it seems weird now. Am I crazy?

I was only interested in Pikmin, Mario RPG, Mario Wonder, and Luigi's Mansion 2 remake.

Then again, that's four titles (six if you count the Pikmin 1-2 releases), so not bad considering how many Directs go.

@T0mizawa "Rayman Legends"

My thought as well, especially with the final shot, where the talking flower says "that goomba looks so serene" just before Mario punts it out of frame. That kind of humor is right up the Rayman alley.

Super Mario: Finally the Mushrooms have Kicked In

One thing I'll say is that there was obviously great effort put into the animation, but it's weird how Mario's eyes are sort of painted on and stuck looking forward, even when he's approaching something right at his feet. It's something you couldn't notice with a small sprite or a SD model but in HD on a big screen it's very noticeable and weird.

Ultimately, This is a game people are going to have to play to appreciate. Just looking at it, the game seems only like a half-step improvement over the very tired "New" series, but if the central mechanic is "touch this special item and random things start happening" then it's going to be a ton of wild fun to experience. I would love it if the random "wonders" are genuinely randomized but that might be a bit too much to ask.

one of my favorite games of all time. I go back and replay it once a year or so. It's like going back to a good book. I can burn through it in three or four sittings. Never gets old.

The way I see it there are three possibilities:

1) There is no timeline. Nintendo felt a sense of obligation to release one and did so half-heartedly. Every game is meant to be a tweaked re-telling of the same "legend." Some games are specifically linked, like Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask, but for the most part these games are retellings of the same basic legend, with some new tweaks here and there because the storyteller is different. There's a princess, a hero, and an evil usurper. The rest is flavor.

2) There is a timeline, but this is a reboot. Previously it was established that the Zora evolved into the Rito. Now we see Rito and Zora existing at the beginning of Hyrule's Kingdom, alongside a race new to the series (as of BOTW): The Zonai. It can't be handwaved. This is a direct contradiction to past games. So, that means Nintendo is rebooting and starting over.

3) There is a timeline, and these two games (BOTW/TOTK) take place so far into the future, it might as well be new. The beginning of Hyrule that we see in TOTK isn't the actual beginning. That was in Skyward Sword, etc. This is sort of a post-apocalyptic Hyrule, maybe a hundred thousand years into the future from Zelda/Zelda II for the NES. That allows for a sense of new beginning, with races that didn't come along until later.

Personally, I don't really care about any overarching timeline. I'd prefer option 1, but options 2 and 3 are basically the same thing anyway.

Like with BOTW, I think it's a 10/10 but not a perfect game, and I don't mean in the technical aspects.

BOTW had a dozen little things I wish Nintendo had put into the game. TOTK rectifies almost every one of those little problems (no-slip gear, better "themed" dungeons, enemy variety, etc). But there are still two big issues that I can't wait to see rectified in future games.

I miss the more robust soundtrack. I appreciate the minimalist style but I think it complemented BOTW more than TOTK. I guess they figured the world is so big and you spend so much time traversing it that a big, blaring "overworld theme" would get repetitive and annoying after a while, but I would like to think game carts are big enough now that we can have longer musical pieces, with more movements, and that can change with the environment. I will say that the dynamic scores in the temples was a big addition I loved. More of that. TOTK was a babystep improvement over BOTW in the music department. I'd like to see bigger steps in the next one.

The other thing is the way the story and dungeons are presented. In this game, even more than in BOTW, you really need to watch the memories in order lest you be spoiled. I'd prefer those memories to be attached to a more obvious linear progression. Make it so that you can still do things all over the map, in whatever order you want, but for this one aspect (the main story), make it so that you have to do them in order, whenever you do them, allowing the cutscenes to play out more cinematically.

I suppose the Temples could be more like the older games. I know why they made them the way they did: You get every item before you enter, so you can't have "dungeon specific gear" and with the Ascent ability, you're limited in how you can design a multi-floor building.

I would be okay with ascent simply being deactivated in certain rooms, etc, if it allowed for more traditional 3D Zelda dungeons. The Temples in TOTK were much improved over BOTW's Divine Beasts, but they were (like with the music) only a half-step improvement vs the peak of the previous 3D games.

Critiques aside, the game is amazing, but it does (or doesn't) do things that I hope the next one does, which is exactly what I said about BOTW.

heart says 10/10
head says 9.5/10

With what is basically a non-existent late-2023 lineup (I'm sure there will be some games for the holiday but nothing has been announced), I expect the next system to drop in the Spring of 2024.

My predictions:

Holiday 2023 features a 3D Donkey Kong game from the EAD Tokyo team as the last big game for the system.

Switch Successor launches in the Spring of 2024 with three big games in the launch window = 3D Mario Game, Mario Kart 9, Metroid Prime 4, and Smash coming by the summer.

You could MAYBE fit that entire video onto a single GB cart lol.

6 but I didn't finish it. I beat Chrono Trigger a dozen times though.

It wasn't until 7 and 8 that I was hooked. Beat both of these then went back to conquer 4 and 6. Fell away from the series after that, though. Switched to Gamecube before playing 9, never had a PS2. Didn't play another FF game until Final Fantasy XV.

Wind Waker Ganondorf is such a great character with a unique design. He gets my vote every time.

He's as old as his tongue and a little bit older than his mustache!

I still have memories of playing Mario on my NES console.

I also have a very fond memory of Christmas 2006, when it rereleased on the Virtual Console.

I'm sure the movie is fine. I've seen the Gaming Historian doc and that's all I'll ever need to see on the subject.

Imagine a trailer a few weeks before BOTW came out that focused exclusively on making food.

I'd say "neat" and then wonder about the real game.

Same thing here.

I think it's almost paramount that the Switch 2 (or whatever it will be called) be backwards compatable with Switch. It needs to be handled the same way the 3DS handled DS compatibility. The same gamecard slot, with the Switch 2 cards being only slightly modified so that they can't be inserted into an OG Switch.

I gave it an 8. I enjoy the combat, and some of the storylines but not all.

I'd like to see the art style applied to a game with a bigger and better story.

It looks like a 32X or early Saturn game. Neat

Y for missiles! Thank you! I was going crazy every time the early part of the game would say "press X for missiles." I played the original on Gamecube a hundred times and I kept thinking "I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be Y."

And then my muscle memory confirmed it, as I spammed the missiles several times in the opening space station, thinking I was entering morph ball mode.

Do we know yet who actually developed the game?